Smart Connected Home

Baby-boomers are starting reach an age of retiring and next in line will be generation Y. Given the aging populations is starting to have stronger correlations with using technology; these are the generations of the computer, the personalized computer, the ipod and the iphone where technology is everywhere and in everything. It seems logical that given that there is this much technology moving into the homes that the same technology should follow us as we age. Hence, our team has been looking into how we can help parents and grandparents with the use of technology and smart designs to make their lives easier and increase their physical home and life integration.
Our current focus in our prototyping has led us to believe we can provide people with
essential needs using technology. We can provide functions that stem from a need for assistance in walking around the home for either medical reasons (muscle weakening, low bone density etc.) or trouble with balance. The older adult population today commonly uses walkers for this scenario, but given the current technology and need for variety in walkers we thought our idea fit best as a post manufacturing add on that could use the current physical systems to provide advanced functionality to the user for easier navigation, increased convenience as well as protective features.
With this project we hope to provide help to people with the new challenges in their
lives. Some people forget how often we walk through doors, traverse obstacles, and even simply cross a room with ease. In this document we hope to show how we hope to provide automated docking to minimize the owners need to remember to charge their walker and burden themselves with trying to physically get themselves to the walker. We also hope to provide something that could potentially open doors for the owner such that they can move through rooms with ease without messing with doorknobs and worrying about closing a door behind them. If it is also deemed necessary we also would like to explore the capabilities of the walker to help protect the owner by either alerting the family if there is cause for concern or just letting a facilities manager know that certain people have left a building as to prevent them from not being able to seek help from any location.
Truly the main drive for this project is to help the owner of this technology maintain
their independence as long as possible, by eliminating the need for physical assistance from family of care givers. We want our users to feel as if they can regain capabilities they thought lost with their physical handicaps and to enjoy just being able to do things when they want and how they want them done.